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Timurids in Transition
Applying the Weberian concept of the routinization of charisma, the book examines the transformation of the nomadic empire of Tamerlane into a sedentary polity based on the Perso-Islamic model by focusing on the reign of the last Timurid ruler Suln-usain Bayqara in fifteenth-century Iran.
- GenresHistory
411 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
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March 18, 2015
A scholarly account of how a Central Asian Khaganate in Iran had morphed into a Turko-Persian Sultanate.
Turko-Mongol administrative culture did not have any separate civilian or military branch. Military commanders of the Dynasty took on administrative duties themselves. Allegiance to the Sultan/Khan was based on the emperor’s charismatic authority and personal relationships, not based on any definite law. The fiscal apparatus of the Dynasty was decentralized; regional administrators would pay taxes to the Emperor, which they would extract from the populace by lawful/unlawful means. Apart from creating strife among the subjects, there was another defect in this decentralized fiscal scheme. The Turko-Mongol military elite families would often get tax-exempt lands as reward for their allegiance to the Khan. As they took up more and more lands that could have provided a hefty income for the imperial coffers, this nomadic custom put a severe strain on the royal treasury and almost paralyzed the Dynasty. Add to this the severe conflict between Turko-Mongol customs and Islamic tradition, and what the Sultans had in their hands was a house of cards prone to collapse any moment.
To legitimatize their authority among the Islamic populace and also to bring in income to the impoverished treasury, the Timurids had to give up their nomadic way of life and government and adapt to the bureaucratic and sedentary lifestyle of their subject Iranian population. They had to abolish the conferring of tax-free lands on Turko-Mongol military elites and employ experienced Persian bureaucrats to keep the system alive. Their characteristic emphasis on strict auditing and accounting practices greatly boosted their revenue from Persia’s vast stretches of arable land. Herat had become as much a food basket as Egypt under Timurid rule. The Timurids were particularly ingenious in utilizing the numerous religious shrines dotting the Iranian landscape as institutions that administered the local agrarian economies and also generated income from swarms of devotees by way of gifts and offerings. The Timurids had turned these shrines into a sort of alternate Ka’bah(the Islamic destination for hajj or pilgrimage), something that belonged exclusively to the Turgo-Mongols and the Iranian populace. These shrines not only helped administer local agrarian practices but also boosted the religious image of these Central Asian rulers in the psyche of the devout Iranian subjects.
This book is a study of how and to what extent the Turko-Mongols absorbed and imprinted on the Persian administrative culture, giving rise to a hybrid Turko-Persian culture. The Timurids never really were completely absorbed by the highly bureaucratized, Islamic culture of their Iranian subject populace. Neither were the Uzbek conquerors who overthrew them; they merely had to start the painful process of acculturation anew.
Turko-Mongol administrative culture did not have any separate civilian or military branch. Military commanders of the Dynasty took on administrative duties themselves. Allegiance to the Sultan/Khan was based on the emperor’s charismatic authority and personal relationships, not based on any definite law. The fiscal apparatus of the Dynasty was decentralized; regional administrators would pay taxes to the Emperor, which they would extract from the populace by lawful/unlawful means. Apart from creating strife among the subjects, there was another defect in this decentralized fiscal scheme. The Turko-Mongol military elite families would often get tax-exempt lands as reward for their allegiance to the Khan. As they took up more and more lands that could have provided a hefty income for the imperial coffers, this nomadic custom put a severe strain on the royal treasury and almost paralyzed the Dynasty. Add to this the severe conflict between Turko-Mongol customs and Islamic tradition, and what the Sultans had in their hands was a house of cards prone to collapse any moment.
To legitimatize their authority among the Islamic populace and also to bring in income to the impoverished treasury, the Timurids had to give up their nomadic way of life and government and adapt to the bureaucratic and sedentary lifestyle of their subject Iranian population. They had to abolish the conferring of tax-free lands on Turko-Mongol military elites and employ experienced Persian bureaucrats to keep the system alive. Their characteristic emphasis on strict auditing and accounting practices greatly boosted their revenue from Persia’s vast stretches of arable land. Herat had become as much a food basket as Egypt under Timurid rule. The Timurids were particularly ingenious in utilizing the numerous religious shrines dotting the Iranian landscape as institutions that administered the local agrarian economies and also generated income from swarms of devotees by way of gifts and offerings. The Timurids had turned these shrines into a sort of alternate Ka’bah(the Islamic destination for hajj or pilgrimage), something that belonged exclusively to the Turgo-Mongols and the Iranian populace. These shrines not only helped administer local agrarian practices but also boosted the religious image of these Central Asian rulers in the psyche of the devout Iranian subjects.
This book is a study of how and to what extent the Turko-Mongols absorbed and imprinted on the Persian administrative culture, giving rise to a hybrid Turko-Persian culture. The Timurids never really were completely absorbed by the highly bureaucratized, Islamic culture of their Iranian subject populace. Neither were the Uzbek conquerors who overthrew them; they merely had to start the painful process of acculturation anew.
Displaying 1 of 1 review